Thread: Negative Exponents

Consider the following:



To express the above with a positive index i.e. to make the the exponent -5/6 positive, we need to do the reciprocal which will be



which comes to



But the correct answer is



Why?

Thanks,

Ron

7 / x^(-5/6)
= [7 / x^(-5/6)] * [x^(5/6) / x^(5/6)] : multiplication by 1
= [7 x^(5/6)] / [x^(-5/6) x^(5/6)]
= [7 x^(5/6)] / x^0
= 7 x^(5/6)